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Copyright, 100$ 
By Dodd, Mead and Company 



Published September, 1905 



PRESSWORK BY THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 
JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U-S.A. 




/// iz/tjt eefi cms 



She came to the village church . Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

I played with her when a child ... 8 
At the head of the village street ... 22 

Alone in an empty house 26 

Gathering woodland lilies 40 

Maud's own little oak-room 44 

I heard her close the door 54 

Come into the garden, Maud .... 72 

On the Breton strand 82 

The phantom cold 90 













I hate the dreadful hollow behind 

the little wood, 
Its lips in the field above are dabbled 

with blood-red heath, 
The red-ribb'd ledges drip with a 

silent horror of blood, 
And Echo there, whatever is ask'd 

her, answers " Death." 



For there in the ghastly pit long 

since a body was found, 
His who had given me life — O father ! 

O God ! was it well ? — 



*>*> 



Mangled, and flatten'd, and crush'd, 
and dinted into the ground : 

There yet lies the rock that fell with 
him when he fell. 

Did he fling himself down ? who 

knows ? for a vast speculation 

had fail'd, 
And ever he mutter'd and madden'd, 

and ever wann'd with despair, 
And out he walk'd when the wind 

like a broken worlding wail'd, 
And the flying gold of the ruin'd 

woodlands drove thro' the air. 

I remember the time, for the roots 

of my hair were stirr'd 
By a shuffled step, by a dead weight 

trail'd, by a whisper'd fright, 
And my pulses closed their gates with 

a shock on my heart as I heard 
The shrill-edged shriek of a mother 

divide the shuddering night. 













Villainy somewhere ! whose ? One 

says, we are villains all. 
Not he : his honest fame should at 

least by me be maintain'd: 
But that old man, now lord of the 

broad estate and the Hall, 
Dropt off gorged from a scheme that 

had left us flaccid and drain'd. 

Why do they prate of the blessings 

of Peace ? we have made them 

a curse, 
Pickpockets, each hand lusting for 

all that is not its own ; 
And lust of gain, in the spirit of 

Cain, is it better or worse 
Than the heart of the citizen hissing 

in the war on his own heartstone ? 

But these are the days of advance, 
the works of the men of mind, 

When who but a fool would have 
faith in a tradesman's ware or 
his word ? 














Is it peace or war ? Civil war, as I 

think, and that of a kind 
The viler, as underhand, not openly 

bearing the sword. 

Sooner or later I too may passively 

take the print 
Of the golden age — why not ? I have 

neither hope nor trust ; 
May make my heart as a millstone, 

set my face as a flint, 
Cheat and be cheated, and die : who 

knows ? we are ashes and dust. 

Peace sitting under her olive, and 

slurring the days gone by, 
When the poor are hovell'd and 

hustled together, each sex, like 

swine, 
When only the ledger lives, and 

when only not all men lie ; 
Peace in her vineyard — yes ! but a 

company forges the wine. 






And the vitriol madness flushes up 

in the ruffian's head, 
Till the filthy by-lane rings to the 

yell of the trampled wife., 
While chalk and alum and plaster 

are sold to the poor for bread, 
And the spirit of murder works in 

the very means of life. 

And Sleep must lie down arm'd, for 

the villainous centre-bits 
Grind on the wakeful ear in the hush 

of the moonless nights, 
While another is cheating the sick or 

a few last gasps, as he sits 
To pestle a poison'd poison behind 

his crimson lights. 

When a Mammonite mother kills 

her babe for a burial fee, 
And Timour-Mammon grins on a 

pile of children's bones, 




Is it peace or war ? better, war ! loud 

war by land and by sea, 
War with a thousand battles, and 

shaking a hundred thrones. 

For I trust if an enemy's fleet came 

yonder round by the hill, 
And the rushing battle-bolt sang from 

the three-decker out of the foam, 
That the smoothfaced snubnosed 

rogue would leap from his counter 

and till, 
And strike, if he could, were it but 

with his cheating yardwand, 

home. 

What ! am I raging alone as my 
father raged in his mood ? 

Must / too creep to the hollow and 
dash myself down and die 

Rather than hold by the law that I 
made, nevermore to brood 









On a horror of shatter'd limbs and a 
wretched swindler's lie ? 

Would there be sorrow for me ? there 

was love in the passionate shriek, 
Love for the silent thing that had 

made false haste to the grave — 
Wrapt in a cloak, as I saw him, and 

thought he would rise and speak 
And rave at the lie and the liar, ah 

God, as he used to rave. 



I am sick of the Hall and the hill, I 

am sick of the moor and the main. 
Why should I stay ? can a sweeter 

chance ever come to me here ? 
O, having the nerves of motion as 

well as the nerves of pain, 
Were it not wise if I fled from the 

place and the pit and the fear ? 



There are workmen up at the Hall : 
they are coming back from abroad ; 












The dark old place will be gilt by 
the touch of a millionaire: 

I have heard, I know not whence, of 
the singular beauty of Maud ; 

I play'd with the girl when a child ; 
she promised then to be fair. 

Maud with her venturous climbings 

and tumbles and childish escapes, 
Maud the delight of the village, the 

ringing joy of the Hall, 
Maud with her sweet purse-mouth 

when my father dangled the grapes, 
Maud the beloved of my mother, 

the moon-faced darling of all, — 

What is she now ? My dreams are 

bad. She may bring me a curse. 
No, there is fatter game on the 

moor ; she will let me alone. 
Thanks, for the fiend best knows 

whether woman or man be the 

worse. 
I will bury myself in my books, and 

the Devil may pipe to his own. 




c^ /y/ciytrf witA. /itr /ir/fex a &&&£ 
















Long have I sigh'd for a calm : God 
grant I may find it at last ! 

It will never be broken by Maud, 
she has neither savour nor salt, 

But a cold and clear-cut face, as I 
found when her carriage past, 

Perfectly beautiful : let it be granted 
her : where is the fault ? 

All that I saw (for her eyes were 
downcast, not to be seen) 

Faultily faultless, icily regular, splen- 
didly null, 

Dead perfection, no more ; nothing 
more, if it had not been 

For a chance of travel, a paleness, an 
hour's defect of the rose, 
















<*v 



^upif^s^y 






Or an underlip, you may call it a 

little too ripe, too full, 
Or the least little delicate aquiline 

curve in a sensitive nose, 
From which I escaped heart-free, with 

the least little touch of spleen. 











Cold and clear-cut face, why come 

you so cruelly meek, 
Breaking a slumber in which all 

spleenful folly was drown'd, 
Pale with the golden beam of an 

eyelash dead on the cheek, 
Passionless, pale, cold face, star- 
sweet on a gloom profound ; 
Womanlike, taking revenge too deep 

for a transient wrong 
Done but in thought to your beauty, 

and ever as pale as before 
Growing and fading and growing 

upon me without a sound, 



A 




Luminous, gemlike, ghostlike, death- 
like, half the night long 
Growing and fading and growing, till 

I could bear it no more, 
But arose, and all by myself in my 

own dark garden ground, 
Listening now to the tide in its 

broad-flung shipwrecking roar, 
Now to the scream of a madden'd 

beach dragg'd down by the wave, 
Walk'd in a wintry wind by a ghastly 

glimmer, and found 
The shining daffodil dead, and Orion 

low in his grave. 



















A million emeralds break from the 
ruby-budded lime 

In the little grove where I sit — ah, 
wherefore cannot I be 

Like things of the season gay, like 
the bountiful season bland, 

When the far-off sail is blown by 
the breeze of a softer clime, 

Half-lost in the liquid azure bloom 
of a crescent of sea, 

The silent sapphire-spangled mar- 
riage ring of the land ? 
























Below me, there, is the village, and 

looks how quiet and small ! 
And yet bubbles o'er like a city, with 

gossip, scandal, and spite ; 
And Jack on his ale-house bench 

has as many lies as a Czar ; 
And here on the landward side, by a 

red rock, glimmers the Hall ; 
And up in the high Hall-garden I 

see her pass like a light ; 
But sorrow seize me if ever that light 

be my leading star ! 

When have I bow'd to her father, 

the wrinkled head of the race ? 
I met her to-day with her brother, 

but not to her brother I bow'd ; 
I bow'd to his lady-sister as she rode 

by on the moor ; 
But the fire of a foolish pride flash'd 

over her beautiful face. 
O child, you wrong your beauty, 

believe it, in being so proud ; 



Your father has wealth well-gotten, 
and I am nameless and poor. 

I keep but a man and a maid, ever 

ready to slander and steal ; 
I know it, and smile a hard-set smile, 

like a stoic, or like 
A wiser epicurean, and let the world 

have its way : 
For nature is one with rapine, a harm 

no preacher can heal ; 
The Mayfly is torn by the swallow, 

the sparrow spear'd by the shrike, 
And the whole little wood where I 

sit is a world of plunder and prey. 

We are puppets, Man in his pride,, 

and Beauty fair, in her flower ; 
Do we move ourselves, or are moved 

by an unseen hand at a game 
That pushes us ofF from the board, 

and others ever succeed ? 
Ah yet, we cannot be kind to each 

other here for an hour ; 






We whisper, and hint, and chuckle, 
and grin at a brother's shame ; 

However we brave it out, we men 
are a little breed. 

A monstrous eft was of old the Lord 

and Master of Earth, 
For him did his high sun flame, and 

his river billowing ran, 
And he felt himself in his force to 

be Nature's crowning race. 
As nine months go to the shaping 

an infant ripe for his birth, 
So many a million of ages have gone 

to the making of man : 
He now is first, but is he the last? 

is he not too base ? 

The man of science himself is fonder 

of glory, and vain, 
An eye well-practised in nature, a 

spirit bounded and poor ; 
The passionate heart of the poet is 

whirl'd into folly and vice. 



I would not marvel at either, but 

keep a temperate brain ; 
For not to desire or admire, if a man 

could learn it, were more 
Than to walk all day like the sultan 

of old in a garden of spice. 

For the drift of the Maker is dark, 

an Isis hid by the veil. 
Who knows the ways of the world, 

how God will bring them about? 
Our planet is one, the suns are many, 

the world is wide. 
Shall I weep if a Poland fall ? shall I 

shriek if a Hungary fail ? 
Or an infant civilisation be ruled 

with rod or with knout ? 
I have not made the world, and He 

that made it will guide. 

Be mine a philosopher's life in the 
• quiet woodland ways, 
Where if I cannot be gay let a pas- 
sionless peace be my lot, 



Far-off from the clamour of liars 

belied in the hubbub of lies ; 
From the long-neck'd geese of the 

world that are ever hissing dispraise 
Because their natures are little, and, 

whether he heed it or not, 
Where each man walks with his head 

in a cloud of poisonous flies. 

And most of all would I flee from 

the cruel madness of love, 
The honey of poison-flowers and all 

the measureless ill. 
Ah Maud, you milk-white fawn, you 

are all unmeet for a wife. 
Your mother is mute in her grave as 

her image in marble above ; 
Your father is ever in London, you 

wander about at your will; 
You have but fed on the roses, and 

lain in the lilies of life. 




fs 



A voice by the cedar tree, 

In the meadow under the Hall ! 

She is singing an air that is known 

to me, 
A passionate ballad gallant and gay, 
A martial song like a trumpet's call ! 
Singing alone in the morning of life, 
In the happy morning of life and of 

May, 
Singing of men that in battle array, 
Ready in heart and ready in hand, 
March with banner and bugle and fife 
To the death, for their native land. 



Maud with her exquisite face, 
And wild voice pealing up to the 
sunny sky, 



1 9 



And feet like sunny gems on an 

English green, 
Maud in the light of her youth and 

her grace, 
Singing of Death, and of Honour 

that cannot die, 
Till I well could weep for a time so 

sordid and mean, 
And myself so languid and base. 

Silence, beautiful voice ! 

Be still, for you only trouble the 

mind 
With a joy in which I cannot rejoice, 
A glory I shall not find. 
Still ! I will hear you no more, 
For your sweetness hardly leaves me 

a choice 
But to move to the meadow and fall 

before 
Her feet on the meadow grass, and 

adore. 












Not her, who is neither courtly nor 

kind, 
Not her, not her, but a voice. 




Morning arises stormy and pale, 
No sun, but a wannish glare 
In fold upon fold of hueless cloud, 
And the budded peaks of the wood 

are bow'd 
Caught and cuff'd by the gale ; 
I had fancied it would be fair. 

Whom but Maud should I meet 
Last night, when the sunset burn'd 
On the blossom'd gable-ends 
At the head of the village street, 
Whom but Maud should I meet ? 
And she touch'd my hand with a 
smile so sweet 




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She made me divine amends 
For a courtesy not return'd. 

And thus a delicate spark 
Of glowing and growing light 
Thro' the livelong hours of the dark 
Kept itself warm in the heart of my 

dreams, 
Ready to burst in a colour'd flame ; 
Till at last when the morning came 
In a cloud, it faded, and seems 
But an ashen-gray delight. 

What if with her sunny hair, 

And smile as sunny as cold, 

She meant to weave me a snare 

Of some coquettish deceit, 

Cleopatra-like as of old 

To entangle me when we met, 

To have her lion roll in a silken net 

And fawn at a victor's feet. 

Ah, what shall I be at fifty 
Should Nature keep me alive, 



It" I find the world so bitter 
When I am but twenty-five? 
Yet, if she were not a cheat, 
If Maud were all that she seem'd, 
And her smile were all that I 

dream 'd, 
Then the world were not so bitter 
But a smile could make it sweet. 

What if tho' her eye seem'd full 
Of a kind intent to me, 
What if that dandy-despot, he, 
That jewell'd mass of millinery, 
That oil'd and curl'd Assyrian Bull 
Smelling of musk and of insolence, 
Her brother, from whom I keep 

aloof, 
Who wants the finer politic sense 
To mask, tho' but in his own be- 
hoof, 
With a glassy smile his brutal 
scorn — 



jftk 






What if he had told her yestermorn 
How prettily for his own sweet sake 
A face of tenderness might be feign'd, 
And a moist mirage in desert eyes, 
That so, when the rotten hustings 

shake 
In another month to his brazen lies, 
A wretched vote may be gain'd. 

For a raven ever croaks, at my side, 
Keep watch and ward, keep watch 

and ward, 
Or thou wilt prove their tool. 
Yea too, myself from myself I guard, 
For often a man's own angry pride 
Is cap and bells for a fool. 

Perhaps the smile and tender tone 
Came out of her pitying woman- 
hood, 
For am I not, am I not, here alone 
So many a summer since she died, 






My mother, who was so gentle and 

good ? 
Living alone in an empty house, 
Here half-hid in the gleaming wood, 
Where I hear the dead at midday 

moan, 
And the shrieking rush of the wain- 
scot mouse, 
And my own sad name in corners 

cried, 
When the shiver of dancing leaves is 

thrown 
About its echoing chambers wide, 
Till a morbid hate and horror have 

grown 
Of a world in which I have hardly 

mixt, 
And a morbid eating lichen fixt 
On a heart half-turn'd to stone. 

O heart of stone, are you flesh, and 
caught 




te in t*n em. 



47ZCd-C 



By that you swore to withstand ? 
For what was it else within me 

wrought 
But, I fear, the new strong wine of 

love, 
That made my tongue so stammer 

and trip 
When I saw the treasured splendour, 

her hand, 
Come sliding out of her sacred glove, 
And the sunlight broke from her 

lip? 

I have play'd with her when a child ; 
She remembers it now we meet. 
Ah well, well, well, I may be be- 
guiled 
By some coquettish deceit. 
Yet, if she were not a cheat, 
If Maud were all that she seem'd, 
And her smile had all that I dream'd, 
Then the world were not so bitter 

But a smile could make it sweet. 

27 




Did I hear it half in a doze 

Long since, I know not where ? 

Did I dream it an hour ago, 
When asleep in this arm-chair ? 



Men were drinking together, 
Drinking and talking of me ; 

" Well, if it prove a girl, the boy 
Will have plenty ; so let it be." 

Is it an echo of something 
Read with a boy's delight, 

Viziers nodding together 
In some Arabian night? 









28 



Strange, that I hear two men, 
Somewhere, talking of me ; 

" Well, if it prove a girl, my boy 
Will have plenty : so let it be." 



29 



She came to the village church, 
And sat by a pillar alone ; 
An angel watching an urn 
Wept over her, carved in stone ; 
And once, but once, she lifted her 

eyes, 
And suddenly, sweetly, strangely 

blush'd 
To find they were met by my own ; 
And suddenly, sweetly, my heart 

beat stronger 
And thicker, until I heard no longer 
The snowy-banded, dilettante, 



%, 



Delicate-handed priest intone ; 

And thought, is it pride, and mused 

and sigh'd, 
"No surely, now it cannot be pride." 




I was walking a mile, 
More than a mile from the shore, 
The sun look'd out with a smile 
Betwixt the cloud and the moor, 
And riding at set of day 
Over the dark moorland, 
Rapidly riding far away, 
She waved to me with her hand. 
There were two at her side, 
Something flash'd in the sun, 
Down by the hill I saw them ride, 
In a moment they were gone : 
Like a sudden spark 






Struck vainly in the night, 
And back returns the dark 
With no more hope of light. 













Sick, am I sick of a jealous dread? 
Was not one of the two at her side 
This new-made lord, whose splend- 
our plucks 
The slavish hat from the villager's 

head ? 
Whose old grandfather has lately 

died, 
Gone to a blacker pit, for whom 
Grimy nakedness dragging his trucks 
And laying his trams in a poison'd 

gloom 
Wrought, till he crept from a gutted 

mine 
Master of half a servile shire, 
And left his coal all turn'd into gold 
To a grandson, first of his noble line, 
Rich in the grace all women desire, 






Strong in the power that all men 

adore, 
And simper and set their voices 

lower, 

And soften as if to a girl, and hold 
Awe-stricken breaths at a work divine, 
Seeing his gewgaw castle shine, 
New as his title, built last year, 
There amid perky larches and pine, 
And over the sullen-purple moor 
(Look at it) pricking a cockney ear. 




B0 



What, has he found my jewel out? 
For one of the two that rode at her 

side 
Bound for the Hall, I was sure was 

he: 
Bound for the Hall, and I think for 

a bride. 
Blithe would her brother's acceptance 

be. 
Maud could be gracious too, no 

doubt, 




35 




To a lord, a captain, a padded shape, 
A bought commission, a waxen face, 
A rabbit mouth that is ever agape — 
Bought ? what is it he cannot buy ? 
And therefore splenetic, personal, 
" base, 
A wounded thing with a rancourous 

cry, 
At war with myself and a wretched 

race, 
Sick, sick to the heart of life, am I. 

Last week came one to the country 

town, 
To preach our poor little army down, 
And play the game of the despot 

kings, 
Tho' the state has done it and thrice 

as well : 
This broad-brim'd hawker of holy 

things, 
Whose ear is stuff' d with his cotton, 

and rings 



Even in dreams to the chink of his 

pence, 
This huckster put down war ! can he 

tell 
Whether war be a cause or a conse- 
quence? 
Put down the passions that make 

earth Hell ! 
Down with ambition, avarice, pride, 
Jealousy, down! cut off from the mind 
The bitter springs of anger and fear ; 
Down too, down at your own fireside, 
With the evil tongue and the evil ear, 
For each is at war with mankind. 

I wish I could hear again 

The chivalrous battle-song 

That she warbled alone in her joy ! 

I might persuade myself then 

She would not do herself this great 

wrong 
To take a wanton dissolute boy 
For a man and a leader of men. 






Ah God, for a man with heart, head, 

hand, 
Like some of the simple great ones 

gone 
For ever and ever by, 
One still strong man in a blatant land, 
Whatever they call him, what care I, 
Aristocrat, democrat, autocrat — one 
Who can rule and dare not lie. 

And ah for a man to arise in me, 
That the man I am may cease to be ! 



38 










let the solid ground 
Not fail beneath my feet 

Before my life has found 

What some have found so sweet ; 
Then let come what come may, 
What matter if I go mad, 

1 shall have had my day. 



Let the sweet heavens endure, 
Not close and darken above me 

Before I am quite quite sure 
That there is one to love me ; 

Then let come what come may 

To a life that has been so sad, 

I shall have had my day. 






39 











Birds in the high Hall-garden 
When twilight was falling, 

Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud, 
They were crying and calling. 

Where was Maud ? in our wood ; 

And I, who else, was with her, 
Gathering woodland lilies, 

Myriads blow together. 



Birds in our wood sang 
Ringing thro' the vallies, 

Maud is here, here, here 
In among the lilies. 




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I kiss'd her slender hand, 
She took the kiss sedately ; 

Maud is not seventeen, 
But she is tall and stately. 

I to cry out on pride 

Who have won her favour ! 

Maud were sure of Heaven 
If lowliness could save her. 

1 know the way she went 

Home with her maiden posy, 
For her feet have touch'd the meadows 
And left the daisies rosy. 

Birds in the high Hall-garden 
Were crying and calling to her, 

Where is Maud, Maud, Maud, 
One is come to woo her. 

Look, a horse at the door, 

And little King Charles is snarling, 
Go back, my lord, across the moor, 

You are not her darling. 




Scorn'd, to be scorn'd by one that I 

scorn, 
Is that a matter to make me fret? 
That a calamity hard to be borne ? 
Well, he may live to hate me yet. 
Fool that I am to be vext with his 

pride ! 
I past him, I was crossing his lands ; 
He stood on the path a little aside; 
His face, as I grant, in spite of spite, 
Has a broad-blown comeliness, red 

and white, 
And six feet two, as I think, he stands ; 
But his essences turn'd the live air sick, 
And barbarous opulence jewel-thick 
Sunn'd itself on his breast and his 

hands. 






Who shall call me ungentle, unfair, 
I long'd so heartily then and there 
To give him the grasp of fellowship ; 
But while I past he was humming an 

air, 
Stopt, and then with a riding whip 
Leisurely tapping a glossy boot, 
And curving a contumelious lip, 
Gorgonised me from head to foot 
With a stony British stare. 

Why sits he here in his father's chair ? 
That old man never comes to his place: 
Shall I believe him ashamed to be seen? 
For only once, in the village street, 
Last year, I caught a glimpse of his 

face, 
A gray old wolf and a lean. 
Scarcely, now, would I call him a 

cheat ; 
For then, perhaps, as a child of deceit, 
She might by a true descent be untrue ; 



(<S**Z- 



Maud has a garden of roses 
And lilies fair on a lawn ; 
There she walks in her state 
And tends upon bed and bower, 
And thither I climb'd at dawn 
And stood by her garden-gate ; 
A lion ramps at the top, 
He is claspt by a passion-flower. 

Maud's own little oak-room 
(Which Maud, like a precious stone 
Set in the heart of the carven gloom, 
Lights with herself, when alone 



45 












She sits by her music and books, 
And her brother lingers late 
With a roystering company) looks 
Upon Maud's own garden-gate : 
And I thought as I stood, if a hand, 

as white 
As ocean-foam in the moon, were laid 
On the hasp of the window, and my 

Delight 
Had a sudden desire, like a glorious 

ghost, to glide, 
Like a beam of the seventh Heaven, 

down to my side, 
There were but a step to be made. 

The fancy flatter'd my mind, 
And again seem'd overbold ; 
Now I thought that she cared for me, 
Now I thought she was kind 
Only because she was cold. 

I heard no sound where I stood 
But the rivulet on from the lawn 

46 



Running down to my own dark wood ; 
Or the voice of the long sea-wave as 

it swell'd 
Now and then in the dim-gray dawn ; 
But I look'd, and round, all round 

the house I beheld 
The death-white curtain drawn ; 
Felt a horror over me creep, 
Prickle my skin and catch my breath, 
Knew that the death-white curtain 

meant but sleep, 
Yet I shudder'd and thought like a 

fool of the sleep of death. 















So dark a mind within me dwells, 
And I take myself such evil cheer, 

That if I be dear to some one else, 
Then some one else may have 
much to fear ; 

But if I be dear to some one else, 
Then I should be to myself more 
dear. 

Shall I not take care of all that I think, 

Yea ev 'n of wretched meat and drink, 

If I be dear, 

If I be dear to some one else ? 



48 







This lump of earth has left his estate 
The lighter by the loss of his weight ; 
And so that he find what he went to 

seek, 
And fulsome Pleasure clog him, and 

drown 
His heart in the gross mud-honey of 

town, 
He may stay for a year who has 

gone for a week : 
But this is the day when I must speak, 
And I see my Oread coming down, 
O this is the day ! 
O beautiful creature, what am I 
That I dare to look her way ; 



Think I may hold dominion sweet, 
Lord of the pulse that is lord of her 

breast, 
And dream of her beauty with tender 

dread, 
From the delicate Arab arch of her 

feet 
To the grace that, bright and light 

as the crest 
Of a peacock, sits on her shining 

head, 
And she knows it not : O, if she 

knew it, 
To know her beauty might half 

undo it. 
I know it the one bright thing to save 
My yet young life in the wilds of 

Time, 
Perhaps from madness, perhaps from 

crime, 
Perhaps from a selfish grave. 



s° 




What, if she be fasten'd to this fool 

lord, 
Dare I bid her abide by her word ? 
Should I love her so well if she 
Had given her word to a thing so 
--' low ? 

Shall I love her as well if she 
Can break her word were it even 

for me ? 
I trust that it is not so. 

Catch not my breath, O clamorous 

heart, 
Let not my tongue be a thrall to my 

eye, 
For I must tell her before we part, 
I must tell her, or die. 






A 






51 




Go not, happy day, 

From the shining fields, 
Go not, happy day, 

Till the maiden yields. 
Rosy is the West, 

Rosy is the South, 
Roses are her cheeks, 

And a rose her mouth. 
When the happy Yes 

Falters from her lips, 
Pass and blush the news 

O'er the blowing ships, 






Over blowing seas, 

Over seas at rest, 
Pass the happy news, 

Blush it thro' the West; 
Till the red man dance 

By his red cedar tree, 
And the red man's babe 

Leap, beyond the sea. 
Blush from West to East, 

Blush from East to West, 
Till the West is East, 

Blush it thro' the West. 
Rosy is the West, 

Rosy is the South, 
Roses are her cheeks, 

And a rose her mouth. 



<'■'- 




I have led her home, my love, my 

only friend. 
There is none like her, none. 
And never yet so warmly ran my 

blood 

And sweetly, on and on 

Calming itself to the long-wish'd-for 
end, 

Full to the banks, close on the 
promised good. 

None like her, none. 
Just now the dry-tongued laurels' 
pattering talk 



54 
















) 






<jAet&r~c/ /i&r cCttte i^zc dour" 



Seem'd her light foot along the 

garden walk, 
And shook my heart to think she 

comes once more ; 
But even then I heard her close the 

door, 
The gates of Heaven are closed, and 

she is gone. *• 

There is none like her, none. 

Nor will be when our summers have 

deceased. 
O, art thou sighing for Lebanon 
In the long breeze that streams to 

thy delicious East, 
Sighing for Lebanon, 
Dark cedar, tho' thy limbs have here 

increased, 
Upon a pastoral slope as fair, 
And looking to the South, and fed 
With honey'd rain and delicate air, 
And haunted by the starry head 






Of her whose gentle will has changed 
my fate, 

And made my life a perfumed altar- 
flame ; 

And over whom thy darkness must 
have spread 

With such delight as theirs of old, 
thy great 

Forefathers of the thornless garden, 
there 

Shadowing the snow-limb'd Eve from 
whom she came. 

Here will I lie, while these long 

branches sway, 
And you fair stars that crown a happy 

day 
Go in and out as if at merry play, 
Who am no more so all forlorn, 
As when it seem'd far better to be 

born 
To labour and the mattock-harden'd 

hand, 

56 






Than nursed at ease and brought to 

understand 
A sad astrology, the boundless plan 
That makes you tyrants in your iron 

skies, 
Innumerable, pitiless, passionless 

eyes, 
Cold fires, yet with power to burn 

and brand 
His nothingness into man. 

But now shine on, and what care I, 

Who in this stormy gulf have found 
a pearl 

The countercharm of space and hol- 
low sky, 

And do accept my madness, and 
would die 

To save from some slight shame one 
simple girl. 

Would die ; for sullen-seeming Death 
may give 

57 



More life to Love than is or ever 

was 
In our low world, where yet 'tis 

sweet to live. 
Let no one ask me how it came to 

pass ; 
It seems that I am happy, that to me 
A livelier emerald twinkles in the 

grass, 
A purer sapphire melts into the sea. 

Not die ; but live a life of truest 

breath, 
And teach true life to fight with 

mortal wrongs. 
O, why should Love, like men in 

drinking-songs, 
Spice his fair banquet with the dust 

of death ? 
Make answer, Maud mv bliss, 
Maud made my Maud by that long 

lover's kiss, 

58 



Life of my life, wilt thou not answer 
this? 

"The dusky strand of Death in- 
woven here 

With dear Love's tie, makes Love 
himself more dear." 

Is that enchanted moan only the swell 
Of the long waves that roll in yonder 

bay ? 
And hark the clock within, the silver 

knell 
Of twelve sweet hours that past in 

bridal white, 
And died to live, long as my pulses 

play; 
But now by this my, love has closed 

her sight 
And given false death her hand, and 

stol'n away 
To dreamful wastes where footless 



fancies dwell 

59 









Among the fragments of the golden 

day. 
May nothing there her maiden grace 

affright ! 
Dear heart, I feel with thee the 

drowsy spell. 
My bride to be, my evermore delight, 
My own heart's heart and pwnest 

own farewell ; 
It is but for a little space I go, 
And ye meanwhile far over moor 

and fell 
Beat to the noiseless music of the 

night ! 
Has our whole earth gone nearer to 

the glow 
Of your soft splendours that you 

look so bright ? 
/ have climbed nearer out of lonely 

Hell. 
Beat, happy stars, timing with things 

below, 



Beat with my heart more blest than 

heart can tell, 
Blest, but for some dark undercurrent 

woe 
That seems to draw — but it shall not 

be so : 
Let all be well, be well. 





Rp^ 






x| 





Her brother is coming back to-night, 
Breaking up my dream of delight. 

My dream ? do I dream of bliss ? 
I have walk'd awake with Truth. 

when did a morning shine 
So rich in atonement as this 
For my dark-dawning youth, 
Darken'd watching a mother decline 
And that dead man at her heart and 

mine : 
For who was left to watch her but I ? 
Yet so did I let my freshness die. 

1 trust that I did not talk 
To gentle Maud in our walk 






(For often in lonely wanderings 

I have cursed him even to lifeless 

things), 
But I trust that I did not talk, 
Not touch on her father's sin : 
I am sure I did but speak 
Of my mother's faded cheek 
When it slowly grew so thin, 
That I felt she was slowly dying 
Vext with lawyers and harass'd with 

debt: 
For how often I caught her with eyes 

all wet, 
Shaking her head at her son and 

sighing 
A world of trouble within ! 

And Maud too, Maud was moved 
To speak of the mother she loved 
As one scarce less forlorn, 
Dying abroad and it seems apart 
From him who had ceased to share 

her heart, 

63 






And ever mourning over the feud, 
The household Fury sprinkled with 

blood 
By which our houses are torn : 
How strange was what she said, 
When only Maud and the brother 
Hung over her dying bed — 
That Maud's dark father and mine 
Had bound us one to the other, 
Betrothed us over their wine, 
On the day when Maud was born ; 
Seal'd her mine from her first sweet 

breath. 
Mine, mine by a right, from birth 

till death, 
Mine, mine — our fathers have sworn. 

But the true blood spilt had in it a 

heat 
To dissolve the precious seal on a 

bond, 
That, if left uncancell'd, had been so 

sweet : 

6* 






And none of us thought of a some- 
thing beyond, 

A desire that awoke in the heart of 
the child, 

As it were a duty done to the tomb, 

To be friends for her sake, to be 
reconciled ; 

And I was cursing them and my 
doom, 

And letting a dangerous thought run 
wild, 

While often abroad in the fragrant 
gloom 

Of foreign churches — I see her there, 

Bright English lily, breathing a prayer 

To be friends, to be reconciled ! 



But then what a flint is he ! 
Abroad, at Florence, at Rome, 
I find whenever she touch'd on me 
This brother had laugh'd her down, 
And at last, when each came home, 

6S 



He had darken'd into a frown, 
Chid her, and forbid her to speak 
To me, her friend of the years before; 
And this was what had redden'd her 

cheek 
When I bow'd to her on the moor. 

Yet Maud, altho' not blind 
To the faults of his heart and mind, 
I see she cannot but love him, 
And says he is rough but kind, 
And wishes me to approve him, 
And tells me, when she lay 
Sick once, with a fear of worse, 
That he left his wine and horses and 

play, 
Sat with her, read to her, night and 

day, 
And tended her like a nurse. 

Kind ? but the deathbed desire 
Spurn'd by this heir of the liar — 
Rough but kind ? yet I know 







He has plotted against me in this, 
That he plots against me still. 
Kind to Maud ? that were not amiss. 
Well, rough but kind ; why, let it 

be so : 
For shall not Maud have her will ? 

For, Maud, so tender and true, 
As long as my life endures 
I feel I shall owe you a debt 
That I never can hope to pay ; 
And if ever I should forget 
That I owe this debt to you 
And for your sweet sake to yours, 

then, what then shall I say ? — 
If ever I should forget, 

May God make me more wretched 
Than ever I have been yet ! 

So now I have sworn to bury 
All this dead body of hate, 

1 feel so free and so clear 

By the loss of that dead weight, 

6 7 





That I should grow light-headed, I 
fear, 

Fantastically merry ; 

But that her brother comes, like a 

blight 
On my fresh hope, to the Hall 

to-night. 



68 













xx t 

Strange, that I felt so gay, 

Strange, that I tried to-day 

To beguile her melancholy ; 

The Sultan, as we name him, — 

She did not wish to blame him — 

But he vext her and perplext her 

With his worldly talk and folly : 

Was it gentle to reprove her 

For stealing out of view 

From a little lazy lover 

Who but claims her as his due ? 

Or for chilling his caresses 

By the coldness of her manners, 

Nay, the plainness of her dresses ? 

Now I know her but in two, 

Nor can pronounce upon it 

If one should ask me whether 



6q 






The habit, hat, and feather, 
Or the frock and gypsy bonnet 
Be the neater and completer ; 
For nothing can be sweeter 
Than maiden Maud in either. 

But to-morrow, if we live, 
Our ponderous squire will give 
A grand political dinner 
To half the squirelings near ; 
And Maud will wear her jewels, 
And the bird of prey will hover, 
And the titmouse hope to win her 
With his chirrup at her ear. 

A grand political dinner 

To the men of many acres, 

A gathering of the Tory, 

A dinner and then a dance 

For the maids and marriage-makers, 

And every eye but mine will glance 

At Maud in all her glory. 






For I am not invited, 

But, with the Sultan's pardon, 

I am all as well delighted, 

For I know her own rose-garden, 

And mean to linger in it 

Till the dancing will be over ; 

And then, oh then, come out to me 

For a minute, but for a minute, 

Come out to your own true lover, 

That your true lover may see 

Your glory also, and render 

All homage to his own darling, 

Queen Maud in all her splendour. 








Rivulet crossing my ground, 

And bringing me down from the Hall 

This garden-rose that I found, 

Forgetful of Maud and me, 

And lost in trouble and moving round 

Here at the head of a tinkling fall, 

And trying to pass to the sea ; 

O Rivulet, born at the Hall, 

My Maud has sent it by thee 

(If I read her sweet will right) 

On a blushing mission to me, 

Saying in odour and colour, "Ah, be 

Among the roses to-night." 




G cmx, in£c 6n£. atarcCe n , <y%> avtcC 







Come into the garden, Maud, 

For the black bat, night, has flown, 

Come into the garden, Maud, 
I am here at the gate alone ; 

And the woodbine spices are wafted 
abroad, 
And the musk of the roses blown. 



For a breeze of morning moves, 
And the planet of Love is on high, 

Beginning to faint in the light that 
she loves 
On a bed of daffodil sky, 



To faint in the light of the sun she 
loves, 
To faint in his light, and to die. 

All night have the roses heard 
The flute, violin, bassoon ; 

All night has the casement jessamine 
stirr'd 
To the dancers dancing in tune ; 

Till a silence fell with the waking bird, 
And a hush with the setting moon. 

I said to the lily, " There is but one 

With whom she has heart to be gay. 
When will the dancers leave her alone ? 

She is weary of dance and play." 
Now half to the setting moon are gone, 

And half to the rising day; 
Low on the sand and loud on the stone 

The last wheel echoes away. 

I said to the rose, " The brief night 
goes 



^y 






In babble and revel and wine. 
O young lord-lover, what sighs are 
those, 
For one that will never be thine ? 
But mine, but mine," so I sware to 
the rose, 
" For ever and ever, mine." 

And the soul of the rose went into 
my blood, 
As the music clash'd in the hall ; 
And long by the garden lake I stood, 

For I heard your rivulet fall 
From the lake to the meadow and 
on to the wood, 
Our wood, that is dearer than all ; 

From the meadow your walks have 
left so sweet 

That whenever a March-wind sighs 
He sets the jewel-print of your feet 

In violets blue as your eyes, 

75 



To the woody hollows in which we 
meet 
And the valleys of Paradise. 

The slender acacia would not shake 

One long milk-bloom on the tree ; 
The white lake-blossom fell into the 
lake, 

As the pimpernel dozed on the lea ; 
But the rose was awake all night for 
your sake, 

Knowing your promise to me ; 
The lilies and roses were all awake, 

They sigh'd for the dawn and thee. 

Queen rose of the rosebud garden of 
girls, 
Come hither, the dances are done, 
In gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls, 

Queen lily and rose in one ; 
Shine out, little head, sunning over 
with curls, 
To the flowers, and be their sun. 

76 



There has fallen a splendid tear 

From the passion-flower at the gate. 
She is coming, my dove, my dear ; 

She is coming, my life, my fate ; 
The red rose cries, " She is near, she 
is near; " 

And the white rose weeps, " She 
is late ; " 
The larkspur listens, " I hear, I hear;" 

And the lily whispers, " I wait." 

She is coming, my own, my sweet ; 

Were it ever so airy a tread, 
My heart would hear her and beat, 

Were it earth in an earthy bed ; 
My dust would hear her and beat, 

Had I lain for a century dead; 
Would start and tremble under her 
feet, 

And blossom in purple and red. 



















" The fault was mine, the fault was 

mine " — 
Why am I sitting here so stunn'd 

and still, 
Plucking the harmless wild-flower on 

the hill ?— 
It is this guilty hand ! — 
And there rises ever a passionate cry 
From underneath in the darkening 

land — 
What is it, that has been done ? 
O dawn of Eden bright over earth 

and sky, 



The fires of Hell brake out of thy 

rising sun, 
The fires of Hell and of Hate ; 
For she, sweet soul, had hardly 

spoken a word, 
When her brother ran in his rage to 

the gate, 
He came with the babe-faced lord ; 
Heap'd on her terms of disgrace, 
And while she wept, and I strove to 

be cool, 
He fiercely gave me the lie, 
Till I with as fierce as anger spoke, 
And he struck me, madman, over 

the face, 
Struck me before the languid fool, 
Who was gaping and grinning by : 
Struck for himself an evil stroke ; 
Wrought for his house an irredeem- 
able woe ; 
For front to front in an hour we 

stood, 



70 






And a million horrible bellowing 

echoes broke 
From the red-ribb'd hollow behind 

the wood, 
And thunder'd up into Heaven the 

Christless code, 
That must have life for a blow. 
Ever and ever afresh they seem'd to 

grow. 
Was it he lay there with a fading eye ? 
" The fault was mine," he whisper'd, 

"fly!" 
Then glided out of the joyous wood 
The ghastly Wraith of one that I 

know ; 
And there rang on a sudden a pas- 
sionate cry, 
A cry for a brother's blood : 
It will ring in my heart and my ears, 

till I die, till I die. 






Is it gone ? my pulses beat — 
What was it? a lying trick of the 

brain ? 
Yet I thought I saw her stand, 
A shadow there at my feet, 
High over the shadowy land. 
It is gone ; and the heavens fall in a 

gentle rain, 
When they should burst and drown 

with deluging storms 
The feeble vassals of wine and anger 

and lust, 
The little hearts that know not how 

to forgive : 
Arise, my God, and strike, for we 

hold Thee just, 
Strike dead the whole weak race of 

venomous worms, ' 
That sting each other here in the dust ; 
We are not worthy to live. 




See what a lovely shell, 
Small and pure as a pearl, 
Lying close to my foot, 
Frail, but a work divine, 
Made so fairly well 
With delicate spire and whorl, 
How exquisitely minute, 
A miracle of design ! 

What is it ? a learned man 
Could give it a clumsy name. 
Let him name it who can, 
The beauty would be the same. 

The tiny cell is forlorn, 
Void of the little living will 
That made it stir on the shore. 




(O'ri th*e Ajr&tim st/ra^n*)- 



A 



A 



Did he stand at the diamond door 
Of his house in a rainbow frill ? 
Did he push, when he was uncurl'd, 
A golden foot or a fairy horn 
Thro' his dim water-world ? 

Slight, to be crush'd with a tap 
Of my finger-nail on the sand, 
Small, but a work divine, 
Frail, but of force to withstand, 
Year upon year, the shock 
Of cataract seas that snap 
The three-decker's oaken spine 
Athwart the ledges of rock, 
Here on the Breton strand ! 



Breton, not Briton ; here 
Like a shipwreck'd man on a coast 
Of ancient fable and fear — 
Plagued with a flitting to and fro, 
A disease, a hard mechanic ghost 
That never came from on high 



Nor ever arose from below, 

But only moves with the moving eye, 

Flying along the land and the main — 

Why should it look like Maud ? 

Am I to be overawed 

By what I cannot but know 

Is a juggle born of the brain ? 

Back from the Breton coast, 

Sick of a nameless fear, 

Back to the dark sea-line 

Looking, thinking of all I have lost; 

An old song vexes my ear ; 

But that of Lamech is mine. 

For years, a measureless ill, 
For years, for ever, to part — 
But she, she would love me still ; 
And as long, O God, as she 
Have a grain of love for me, 
So long, no doubt, no doubt, 
Shall I nurse in my dark heart, 







However weary, a spark of will 
Not to be trampled out. 

Strange, that the mind, when fraught 
With a passion so intense 
One would think that it well 
Might drown all life in the eye, — 
That it should, by being so over- 
wrought, 
Suddenly strike on a sharper sense 
For a shell, or a flower, little things 
Which else would have been past by ! 
And now I remember, I, 
When he lay dying there, 
I noticed one of his many rings 
(For he had many, poor worm) and 

thought 
It is his mother's hair. 



Who knows if he be dead ? 
Whether I need have fled ? 
Am I guilty of blood ? 



However this may be, 

Comfort her, comfort her, all things 

good, 
While I am over the sea ! 
Let me and my passionate love go by, 
But speak to her all things holy and 

high, 
• Whatever happen to me ! 
Me and my harmful love go by ; 
But come to her waking, find her 

asleep, 
Powers of the height, Powers of the 

deep, 
And comfort her tho' I die. 




Courage, poor heart of stone ! 

I will not ask thee why 

Thou canst not understand 

That thou art left for ever alone : 

Courage, poor stupid heart of stone. — 

Or if I ask thee why, 

Care not thou to reply : 

She is but dead, and the time is at hand 

When thou shalt more than die. 



37 




O that 'twere possible 

After long grief and pain 

To find the arms of my true love 

Round me once again ! 

When I was wont to meet her 
In the silent woody places 
By the home that gave me birtn, 
We stood tranced in long embraces 
Mixt with kisses sweeter sweeter 
Than any thing on earth. 



A shadow flits before me, 
Not thou, but like to thee ; 
Ah Christ, that it were possible 
For one short hour to see 









The souls we loved, that they might 

tell us 
What and where they be. 

It leads me forth at evening, 

It lightly winds and steals 

In a cold white robe before me, 

When all my spirit reels 

At the shouts, the leagues of lights, 

And the roaring of the wheels. 

Half the night I waste in sighs, 
Half in dreams I sorrow after 
The delight of early skies ; 
In a wakeful doze I sorrow 
For the hand, the lips, the eyes, 
For the meeting of the morrow, 
The delight of happy laughter, 
The delight of low replies. 

'Tis a morning pure and sweet, 
And a dewy splendour falls 
On the little flower that clings 






To the turrets and the walls ; 
'Tis a morning pure and sweet, 
And the light and shadow fleet ; 
She is walking in the meadow, 
And the woodland echo rings ; 
In a moment we shall meet; 
She is singing in the meadow, 
And the rivulet at her feet 
Ripples on in light and shadow 
To the ballad that she sings. 

Do I hear her sing as of old, 
My bird with the shining head, 
My own dove with the tender eye ? 
But there rings on a sudden a pas- 
sionate cry, 
There is some one dying or dead, 
And a sullen thunder is roll'd ; 
For a tumult shakes the city, 
And I wake, my dream is fled ; 
In the shuddering dawn, behold, 
Without knowledge, without pity, 




-/ Ac n'/irvn ftrm c c^trl 



/V 



By the curtains of my bed 
That abiding phantom cold. 

Get thee hence, nor come again, 
Mix not memory with doubt ; 
Pass, thou deathlike type of pain, 
Pass and cease to move about, 
'Tis the blot upon the brain 
That will show itself without. 

Then I rise, the eavedrops fall, 
And the yellow vapours choke 
The great city sounding wide ; 
The day comes, a dull red ball 
Wrapt in drifts of lurid smoke 
On the misty river-tide. 

Thro' the hubbub of the market 
I steal, a wasted frame, 
It crosses here, it crosses there, 
Thro' all that crowd confused and 

loud, 
The shadow still the same; 



And on my heavy eyelids 
My anguish hangs like shame. 

Alas for her that met me, 

That heard me softly call, 

Came glimmering thro' the laurels 

At the quiet evenfall, 

In the garden by the turrets 

Of the old manorial hall. 

Would the happy spirit descend, 
From the realms of light and song, 
In the chamber or the street, 
As she looks among the blest, 
Should I fear to greet my friend 
Or to say " forgive the wrong," 
Or to ask her, " take me, sweet, 
To the regions of thy rest " ? 

But the broad light glares and beats, 
And the shadow flits and fleets 
And will not let me be ; 
And I loathe the squares and streets, 













And the faces that one meets, 
Hearts with no love for me : 
Always I long to creep 
Into some still cavern deep, 
There to weep, and weep, and weep 
My whole soul out to thee. 

















Dead, long dead, 

Long dead ! 

And my heart is a handful of dust, 

And the wheels go over my heed, 

And my bones are shaken with pain, 

For into a shallow grave they are 

thrust, 
Only a yard beneath the street, 
And the hoofs of the horses beat, beat, 
The hoofs of the horses beat, 
Beat into my scalp and my brain, 
With never an end to the stream of 

passing feet, 
Driving, hurrying, marrying, burying, 
Clamour and rumble, and ringing and 

clatter, 
And here beneath it is all as bad, 



For I thought the dead had peace, 

but it is not so ; 
To have no peace in the grave, is 

that not sad? 
But up and down and to and fro, 
Ever about me the dead men go ; 
And then to hear a dead man chatter 
Is enough to drive one mad. 

Wretchedest age, since Time began, 
They cannot even bury a man ; 
And tho' we paid our tithes in the 

days that are gone, 
Not a bell was rung, not a prayer 

was read ; 
It is that which makes us loud in the 

world of the dead ; 
There is none that does his work, 

not one ; 
A touch of their office might have 

sufficed, 
But the churchmen fain would kill 

their church, 

95 






As the churches have kill'd their 
Christ. 

See, there is one of us sobbing, 

No limit to his distress : 

And another, a lord of all things, 
praying 

To his own great self, as I guess ; 

And another, a statesman there, be- 
traying 

His party-secret, fool, to the press; 

And yonder a vile physician, blabbing 

The case of his patient — all for what ? 

To tickle the maggot born in an 
empty head, 

And wheedle a world that loves him 
not, 

For it is but a world of the dead. 

Nothing but idiot gabble ! 
For the prophecy given of old 
And then not understood, 
He has come to pass as foretold ; 

96 



Not let any man think for the public 

good, 
But babble, merely for babble. 
For I never whisper'd a private affair 

i Within the hearing of cat or mouse, 

No, not to myself in the closet alone, 
But I heard it shouted at once from 

the top of the house ; 
Everything came to be known 
Who told him we were there ? 







Not that gray old wolf, for he came 

not back 
From the wilderness, full of wolves, 

where he used to lie; 
He has gather'd the bones of his 

o'ergrown whelp to crack ; 
Crack them now for yourself, and 

howl, and die. 

Prophet, curse me the blabbing lip, 
And curse me the British vermin, 
the rat ; 



97 






I know not whether he came in the 

Hanover ship, 
But I know that he lies and listens 

mute 
In an ancient mansion's crannies and 

holes : 
Arsenic, arsenic, sure, would do it, 
Except that now we poison our babes, 

poor souls ! 
It is all used up for that. 

Tell him now : she is standing here 

at my head ; 
Not beautiful now, not even kind ; 
He may take her now; for she never 

speaks her mind, 
But is ever the one thing silent 

here. 
She is not of us, as I divine ; 
She comes from another stiller world 

of the dead, 
Stiller, not fairer than mine. 

9 s 








But I know where a garden grows, 
Fairer than aught in the world beside, 
All made up of the lily and rose 
That blow by night, when the season 

is good, 
To the sound of dancing music and 

flutes : 
It is only flowers, they had no fruits, 
And I almost fear they are not roses, 

but blood ; 
For the keeper was one, so full of 

pride, 
He linkt a dead man there to a 

spectral bride ; 
For he, if he had not been a Sultan 

of brutes, 
Would he have that hole in his side ? 

But what will the old man say ? 

He laid a cruel snare in a pit 

To catch a friend of mine one stormy 

day; 

J 

99 










Yet now I could even weep to think 

of it; 
For what will the old man say 
When he comes to the second corpse 

in the pit ? 

Friend, to be struck by the public foe, 
Then to strike him and lay him low, 
That were a public merit, far, 
Whatever the Quaker holds, from sin ; 
But the red life spilt for a private 

blow — 
I swear to you, lawful and lawless war 
Are scarcely even akin. 

O me, why have they not buried me 

deep enough ? 
Is it kind to have made me a grave 

so rough, 
Me, that was never a quiet sleeper? 
Maybe still I am but half-dead; 
Then I cannot be wholly dumb ; 









*>? 



I will cry to the steps above my head, 
And somebody, surely, some kind 

heart will come 
To bury me, bury me 
Deeper, ever so little deeper. 








XXWVHI 



My life has crept so long on a broken 

wing 
Thro' cells of madness, haunts of 

horror and fear, 
That I come to be grateful at last for 

a little thing ; 
My mood is changed, for it fell at a 

time of year 
When the face of nights is fair on the 

dewy downs, 
And the shining daffodil dies, and 

the Charioteer 
And starry Gemini hang like glorious 

crowns 
Over Orion's grave low down in the 

west, 






That like a silent lightning under the 

stars 
She seem'd to divide in a dream from 

a band of the blest, 
And spoke of a hope for the world 

in the coming wars — 
"And in that hope, dear soul, let 

trouble have rest, 
Knowing I tarry for thee," and 

pointed to Mars 
As he glow'd like a ruddy shield on 

the Lion's breast. 

And it was but a dream, yet it yielded 

a dear delight 
To have look'd, tho' but in a dream, 

upon eyes so fair, 
That had been in a weary world my 

one thing bright ;. 
And it was but a dream, yet it 

lighten'd my despair 
When I thought that a war would 

arise in defence of the right, 



That an iron tyranny now should 

bend or cease, 
The glory of manhood stand on his 

ancient height, 
Nor Britain's one sole God be the 

millionaire : 
No more shall commerce be all in 

all, and Peace 
Pipe on her pastoral hillock a languid 

note, 
And watch her harvest ripen, her herd 

increase, 
Nor the cannon-bullet rust on a 

slothful shore, 
And the cobweb woven across the 

cannon's throat 
Shall shake its threaded tears in the 

wind no more. 

And as months ran on and rumour 

of battle grew, 
" It is time, it is time, O passionate 

heart," said I 






















(For I cleaved to a cause that I felt 

to be pure and true), 
" It is time, O passionate heart and 

morbid eye, 
That old hysterical mock -disease 

should die." 
And I stood on a giant deck and 

mix'd my breath 
With a loyal people shouting a battle 

cry, 
Till I saw the dreary phantom arise 

and fly 
Far into the North, and battle, and 

seas of death. 

Let it go or stay, so I wake to the 

higher aims 
Of a land that has lost for a little her 

lust of gold, 
And love of a peace that was full of 

wrongs and shames, 
Horrible, hateful, monstrous, not to 

be told ; 

ios 




And hail once more to the banner of 

battle unroll'd ! 
Tho' many a light shall darken, and 

many shall weep 
For those that are crush'd in the 

clash of jarring claims, 
Yet God's just wrath shall be wreak'd 

on a giant liar ; 
And many a darkness into the light 

shall leap, 
And shine in the sudden making of 

splendid names, 
And noble thought be freer under 

the sun, 
And the heart of a people beat with 

one desire ; 
For the peace, that I deem'd no 

peace, is over and done, 
And now by the side of the Black 

and Baltic deep, 
And deathful-grinning mouths of the 

fortress, flames 



106 



rv rs 



The blood-red blossom of war with 
a heart of fire. 

Let it flame or fade, and the war roll 

down like a wind, 
We have proved we have hearts in a 

cause, we are noble still, 
And myself have awaked, as it seems, 

to the better mind ; 
It is better to fight for the good, 

than to rail at the ill ; 
I have felt with my native land, I 

am one with my kind, 
I embrace the purpose of God, and 

the doom assign'd. 



OCT 23 1905 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




010 093 677 A 



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